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Sheep Trails
USDA-ARS Sheep Industry Stakeholder Update
About Sheep Trails
Welcome to the U.S. MARC Sheep Trails StoryMap. This StoryMap highlights and shares research on solutions to challenges the U.S. sheep industry faces with sheep producers, researchers, and the public.
Below, you will be able to learn about research in four general categories:
- Characterization of genetic resources contains research which has reported within and across breed differences and gene variant effects as they relate to wool, reproduction, growth, and carcass traits.
- Creating genomic tools references publications which moved genetic testing in sheep populations and forward.
- Animal health and welfare genetics covers the impact of lentiviruses in sheep populations how to genetically decrease its prevalence in the flock through management and genetic selection.
- Nutritional regulation expands on feed supplementations and characteristics of nutrition in the small ruminant.
For further information about these studies, please visit the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center
For media queries, please contact the USDA-ARS Office of Communications at ARSPress@USDA.GOV.
Director's Pen
Hello from USMARC and welcome to our Sheep Trails Story Map!
As always, our goal is to provide our producer stakeholders with new research and news of interest. Let us know what you like and would like to see more, and we will do our best to make our website as valuable as possible.
As we transition into a post-pandemic new normal here at USMARC, we are returning to some of our critical program priorities and interactions with industry stakeholders. For example, we have updated our stakeholder advisory group to increase the producer diversity and input. We are also returning to our Blue-Ribbon Panel work for animal management, animal care and wellbeing, and overall husbandry program management. We are excited to re-engage with our great industry supporters. Thanks for your continued support and let us know if you would like to participate in these critical efforts for USMARC.
We had a great visit from our NC-214 colleagues at USMARC for their annual meeting in June. This is a critically important group of sheep industry experts, and their work is imperative to the future success of the industry. This meeting is always valuable to USMARC, as we strive to provide industry solutions and build highly effective research collaborations.
Some good APHIS news! Since our last stakeholder update, we have had two clean and proactive inspections from APHIS. The overall health, productivity, and management of the USMARC flocks continues to be excellent, but we are always looking for opportunities to grow and improve. Our APHIS colleagues are complementary, and we appreciate their assistance in our efforts to continue to improve our programs.
Lambing at USMARC starting in 2021 now includes a fall flock and a corresponding increase in ewe numbers. Consequently, the sheep crew is lambing in March through May and again in September and October. We are able to provide care for all of the ewes by splitting them into the two groups. This also better facilitates research needs.
Many thanks to our research partners in Booneville, Arkansas, and DuBois, Idaho. Our collaborations with these sister locations promise to produce a tremendous benefit to the sheep industry. These partnerships also served to inform our new ARS 5-year research programs which we have completed and are now being implemented. See an overview of our new plan in this update.
Lastly, we are excited and optimistic for our sheep research program here at USMARC! Please join us on our journey and let us know how we can make our programs even better. We need your support on the ground and in Washington, DC. Help us to help you!
Thank you for visiting!
Mark
Conceptual overview of the project objectives, the individual experiments contributing to the different objectives, and the anticipated deliverables to the industry as outcomes of success.
Research Focus - Characterization of Genetic Resources
Research Focus - Creating Genomic Tools
Research Focus - Genetics of Animal Health & Welfare
Research Focus - Nutritional Regulation
THANK YOU!
Thank you for visiting the Sheep Trails story map! We will add new publications yearly for your viewing. Please check back for the latest research happening.